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Zul'jin is going live and this time there is no PTR. Usually, every new Hero that's supposed to be released can be tested out on PTR one week before going live.

The patch also includes the Tournament Draft for Custom Games, which allows players to swap Heroes at will at the end of the draft.

Blizzard Entertainment

New Hero: Zul'jin

Before the elves and their Alliance, the forests of Lordaeron belonged to the trolls of the Amani empire. As their warlord, Zul’jin has united the tribes into an army that stands ready to take back what is theirs and to slay the elves who stole it from them.

Zul’jin throws an axe forward, dealing damage to the first 2 enemies hit and marking them for 8 seconds. Marked enemies take 50% bonus damage from Zul’jin’s next 3 Basic Attacks against them.

Twin Cleave (W)

Throw 2 axes in a large circular arc, dealing damage and slowing affected enemies by 15% per axe for 2 seconds.

Regeneration (E)

Zul’jin channels to regenerate 25% of his maximum Health over 4 seconds. Moving or taking damage while channeling will interrupt this effect.

Heroic Abilities

Taz’dingo (R)

Zul’jin is Unkillable for the next 4 seconds, and cannot be reduced to less than 1 Health. Taz’dingo!

Guillotine (R)

Zul’jin throws a massive guillotine blade into the sky that crashes down on enemies in the targeted area. The lower Zul’jin’s Health, the more damage it deals.

Shop

Bundles

New Bundles

Emberlord Zul’jin Bundle – Available until January 17, 2017

Removed Bundles

Lil’ Ragnaros Bundle

Maraudin’ Muradin Bundle

Winter Veil 2016 Bundle

Winter Veil Classic Bundle

New Hero

Zul’jin has been added to the in-game Shop.

Mounts

New Mounts

Amani War Bear – Available by purchasing the Emberlord Zul’jin Bundle

Removed Mounts

Cyber Ram

Special Snowflake

Festive Treasure Goblin

New Skins

Emberlord Zul’jin

Master Zul’jin

User Interface

New Draft Mode: Tournament Draft

Tournament Draft is a new draft mode added to Custom Games which allows players to swap their Hero Picks at-will at the end of a draft.

Set up a Custom Game to use Tournament Draft by clicking the Lobby Mode dropdown, and then selecting Tournament Draft from the list.

All pick and ban timers have been set to 60 seconds during Tournament Draft mode.

Tournament Draft uses First Come, First Served (FCFS) pick order, and Mid Bans.

Once all picks and bans are complete, a 20-second Swap Round will begin.

During this time, players can freely swap Hero picks with their teammates to help ensure that everyone is playing their strongest Heroes.

After swapping Heroes with a teammate, the swap button next to that player’s name will go on a brief cooldown in order to prevent repeated or accidental swaps.

During a Tournament Draft, player names will not be visible to Referees or Spectators and picks will appear from top to bottom.

Chat will not be visible to spectators in the Draft screen.

Please Note: This is our first implementation of Tournament Draft mode, and we plan to bring additional improvements and adjustments to it with future patches.

In-Game

Removed the Targeting indicator from Tracer’s Status Bar.

MVP and Commendations

The MVP screen will now display the MVP’s top three stats from the match instead of only displaying the stats that were the Best in Game or Best in Team.

Team League

A notification has been added to inform two-player parties when they may experience long wait times in the Team League queue and encourage them to add more party members to find matches more quickly.

Design & Gameplay

Armor & Vulnerability

Developer Comments: With today’s patch you will notice that a lot of our tooltips that used to reference the Resistant/Vulnerable system have been changed. Matthew Cooper detailed the changes on our forums last month explaining a bit about the new system. While the tooltips may have changed, the actual functionality for the system has been in since the Varian patch hit during the week of November 14, so the game itself should not feel any different than what you are currently used to. You will also notice that we have added baseline Armor to three Heroes – Arthas, Anub’arak, and Greymane’s Worgen Form. These are the first of a handful that we are planning to release and would love to hear any feedback you have. We are hoping that the Armor System will open up future design flexibility, increase the depth of strategy (both in game, and in draft), and grant us another knob to help balance the game.

Battlegrounds

Haunted Mines

Grave Golem

Attack Damage scaling for summoned Grave Golems has been increased at all stages of the game.

Assassin

Greymane

Stats

Now has 10 Armor while in Worgen form

Lunara

Talents

Level 7

Nature's Culling and Siphoning Toxin have had their icon colors swapped (Siphoning Toxin now has the green icon since it heals.) Their position in the talent tier remains the same.

Nova

Talents

Level 1

Tactical Espionage (Passive)

Removed

Advanced Cloaking (Passive)

Now also restores 2 Mana per second while Stealthed

Covert Ops (Passive)

Functionality changed:

After being Stealthed for 5 seconds, Pinning Shot’s slow is increased to 55% and costs no Mana. Bonus is lost after losing Stealth for 1 second.

Developer Comments: The functionality of Covert Ops was overly complex for such a simple concept: Buff your Pinning Shot if you’ve been cloaked for a while. The talent was performing well, so this isn’t an attempt to make it worse or better, but rather make it more clear when you have the bonus and when you don’t. Tactical Espionage, however, was underperforming quite a bit, so we decided to roll some of its components into Advanced Cloaking, since the fantasy and flavor of both talents were so aligned anyways.

Raynor

Talents

Level 4

Relentless Leader (E)

Now places an inactive button on the item bar to display the cooldown of this talent’s AoE Knockback effect

Now increases Movement Speed while channeling All Shall Burn from 40 to 80%

Gluttonous Ward (Active)

Cooldown reduced from 60 to 45 seconds

Level 16

Sin for Sin (Active)

Reduced cooldown from 60 to 45 seconds

Imposing Presence (Active)

Removed

Developer Comments: For a while now, Azmodan’s All Shall Burn hasn’t been an attractive ability to build around. We’re making part of March of Sin baseline to make it feel a little more useful in the early game, and reducing the initial cast range but increasing the tether range require to cancel it so that it will more consistently get some value (instead of cancelling immediately if cast at maximum range). A few of his less powerful Talents are also being improved to better fit the gluttonous Lord of Sin’s tastes.

Sylvanas

Abilities

Mind Control (R)

Cast range increased from 10 to 11

Cooldown decreased from 70 to 60 seconds

Talents

Level 1

Paralysis (Trait)

Removed

New Talent: Dreadful Wake (E)

Haunting Wave now disables Minions and Mercenaries for 7 seconds

Restores 5 Mana per minion hit by Haunting Wave

Level 7

Possession (Active)

Cooldown per charge decreased from 12 to 8 seconds

Level 13

Will of the Forsaken (Active)

Movement speed increased from 30 to 40%

Developer Comments: With the reintroduction of Haunted Mines, we wanted to take a look at Sylvanas and her ability to disable structures. While we feel this is a very important aspect of who Sylvanas is, the Paralysis talent at level 1 pushed this gameplay a little too far. Beyond that, we introduced a new level 1 talent to fill this spot and made some tuning changes to some of her under-performing talents.

Warrior

Anub'arak

Stats

Now has 25 Spell Armor

Health decreased from 2226 to 2003

Health Regeneration decreased from 4.64 to 4.17

Arthas

Stats

Now has 15 Physical Armor

Bug Fixes

General

Corrected a number of typos and tooltip errors across several aspects of the game.

Art

Chromie: Chromie’s Hourglass will no longer appear to flicker after casting Hearthstone while moving.

Samuro: A bowl no longer appears at Samuro’s feet during his dance animation.

Battlegrounds

Punisher Arena: Casting Zeratul’s Void Prison on Punishers just before they leap will no longer prevent them from attacking when Void Prison ends.

Temple Arena: Fixed an issue that could prevent Temples from activating correctly during the second round of the Brawl.

Battlefield of Eternity & Infernal Shrines: Fixed an animation pop affecting Towers on the Heaven side of Diablo-themed Battlegrounds.

Sky Temple: Fixed an animation pop affecting Temple Guardians.

Try Mode: Fixed an animation issue affecting the allied Keep.

Heroes, Abilities, and Talents

Alarak: Telekinesis will now correctly interrupt E.T.C.’s Mosh Pit.

Diablo: The Hellgate Talent is no longer removed after being struck by Falstad’s Hinterland Blast Heroic.

Diablo: The Hellgate Talent is no longer removed after being struck by the Archangel’s Bulletstorm Ability on Braxis Holdout.

Gazlowe: Rock-It! Turret range indicators will now correctly display while they are active.

Kharazim: Becoming trapped by Chromie’s Time Trap while using Radiant Dash with the Way of the Hundred Fists Talent will no longer prevent Kharazim from issuing Basic Attacks until Radiant Dash is cast a second time.

Raynor: Fixed an issue causing Hyperion to gain benefits from several of Raynor’s Basic Attack Talents.

Samuro: The cooldown for Critical Strike will no longer stop counting down when he is killed.

Samuro: Casting Mirror Image after learning Way of Illusion will no longer cause a Talent Quest progress sound to play.

Samuro: Fixed an issue that could cause certain Hero Abilities and Summons to continue tracking the primary Samuro after casting Mirror Image.

Thrall: The Earthquake tooltip has been updated to reflect that it pulses once every 4 seconds.

Tychus: The range indicator for Overkill will now correctly display while the Ability is active.

Tychus: The range indicator for Drakken Laser Drill will now correctly display while the Ability is active.

Zeratul: Fixed an issue that could prevent Shields granted by the Shroud of Adun Talent from fully recharging.

Zeratul: Shroud of Adun will no longer accumulate Shields while using Hearthstone.

Zeratul: Seeker in the Dark’s duration is now correctly paused while a target affected by Singularity Spike is caught within Void Prison.

Sound

Core: Fixed an issue that could prevent the Core on the Hell side of Battlefield of Eternity and Infernal Shrines from playing certain attack sounds.

User Interface

Death Recap: Fixed an issue that could cause Death Recaps to show inaccurate final blow damage.

Minimap: Catapult Minimap icons are now slightly lighter in color to help players more easily differentiate them from other Minions.

Profile: Fixed an issue in which the player portrait would not update correctly after selecting the Blackheart's Revenge portrait.

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Armor... interesting. Wonder what made them add the mechanic? I figure it would just make another moving piece to try and balance, especially since you can't increase/decrease it with any existing mechanic.
Also, Sylvanas changes makes me nervous. Why did mind-control get a buff when it's one of the strongest ultimates in the game at taking out a high-priority target?

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Armor... interesting. Wonder what made them add the mechanic? I figure it would just make another moving piece to try and balance, especially since you can't increase/decrease it with any existing mechanic.
Also, Sylvanas changes makes me nervous. Why did mind-control get a buff when it's one of the strongest ultimates in the game at taking out a high-priority target?

I was expecting her to be needed giving how she often gets banned.

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Exactly! And you also add in that 7 second stun (didn't realize I read that right as SEVEN!!!!) to minion and merc (and I assume Zerg?). That's a hell of a stun on any bruiser or siege camp. Thankfully they didn't let that stun hit structures too or she'd become an auto-ban. I bet blizzard does a quick rework on these two changes in particular.

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Thankfully they didn't let that stun hit structures too or she'd become an auto-ban.

If you read the dev comment it's clear that the reason this talent was even created was that the old talent was too strong specically against structures, so it's no surprise that it doesn't work on structures. Overall I think this talent is a nerf and I can't see choosing it over overflowing quiver. The main issue is that haunting wave is a longish cooldown and your only mobility/escape tool, and it's almost always wrong to burn it for waveclear (especially when Sylv has tons of other strong tools to evaporate waves).

mind control buff seems minor and given the prominence of wailing arrow I'm not too worried.

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We present our ninth Heroes of the Storm Meta Tier List for the Garrosh patch of August 2017.
Our ninth Heroes of the Storm Meta Tier List for the month of August 2017 is here!

Welcome to Icy Veins's Meta Tier List for the Garrosh patch. The goal if of this list is to try and detail game's current metagame state. The prime goal of such lists is to inform players regarding popular and trending team composition drafting strategies (i.e. the drafting metagame). Although tier listings are generally the product of balance, many factors come into play when discussing the relative perceived strengths of heroes, including player regions, maps, play style, skill level, and, of course, personal perception. As such, any tier list—including this very one—should never be interpreted as gospel, but rather, as a guide to better grasp what to expect with regards to typical drafting experiences. One useful application of such lists is to allow you know which heroes to look out for in terms of practice and counterplay, ultimately improving your knowledge of the game.

Using the list
As stated above, tier lists are easy to mistake for gospel. As new strategies are discovered and experimented with, so changes the perception of the relative strengths of each hero. Tier lists still prove to be useful as a snapshot of player expectations in terms of drafting. Although it is generally considered preferable to focus on high tier heroes (Prime and Core tiers), it is important to note that Heroes of the Storm's wild character and map designs make it so that any given hero's tier position is prone to fluctuate depending on the situation at hand.
One classic example of such is that of Kerrigan on the Infernal Shrines map. Although we currently judge her to be a mid-tier hero, her drafting priority shoots up to first-pick or first-ban material on this specific map due to the nature of its objective. Certain heroes also synergise so well with each other that the sole fact of having the opportunity of drafting them together is generally enough to increase their potential. Tassadar and Tracer, for instance, are generally nightmarish to deal with for many. There are too many examples of these interactions to reasonably produce here, but we invite you to consult our guides to know exactly where and when each hero shines. The guides have been linked in the lists below for your convenience - just click any of the hero names to access them.
A ↑ next to a hero's name means its tier list position has increased since the previous month whereas a ↓ means just the opposite. Additionally, a + or - sign indicates short-to-medium term predictions (which is to say, about a month) for tier increase(s) or decrease(s), respectively. These are often updated after significant balance patches and/or when clear trends are emerging.
If you're newer to the game, also consider visiting our glossary for a comprehensive list of discrete Heroes of the Storm terms.

Prime Tier
Warrior
Assassin
Support
Specialist
Anub'arak
Genji
Uther
-
Stitches↑
Greymane↑
Tassadar↑
Malthael
Prime tier heroes are considered to be extremely strong in all situations, and show no obvious weakness. They are very often banned or picked right away, as they generally dictate the pace of most matches.

Core Tier
Warrior
Assassin
Support
Specialist
Arthas
Falstad
Auriel
Nazeebo
Dehaka
Gul'dan-
Rehgar
Sylvanas
Diablo+
Li-Ming
Stukov
Xul↑
E.T.C.↑
The Butcher↑
Garrosh (new!)
Valla
Sonya
Zeratul
Varian (Tank)
Core tier heroes are strong in a wide variety of situations and have few counter-picking possibility. They should form the core of your team, and be picked after Prime Tier heroes have been distributed.

Bottom Tier
The Lost Vikings
Bottom tier Heroes are deemed to be either considerably weaker than the majority of other Heroes, or much more challenging to play properly. Although they may situationally shine, these Heroes are generally avoided by most players.

Metagame assessment
Greetings. Regulars may have noticed that the changes featured in this month's list have been more aggressive than usual. In essence, I feel like a clear metagame is finally begin to emerge after a slew of important changes, making it easier for me to pinpoint notable trends. And so, the result is a volatile tier list that should be extremely stable next month. Shall we begin?
I like Garrosh quite a bit, and I can't help but feel that the combined novelty and high skill cap skew his win rates towards the bottom of the roster. Case in point: his Master level win rates are nearly 12% higher than his Bronze level win rates. This is a case of Medivh all over again; however, whereas both Garrosh and Medivh did start at 30-something-percent win rates, Garrosh has been steadily climbing over the week. Both Diablo and Stitches are currently very popular picks, and Garrosh provides similar utility through his Groundbreaker + Wrecking Ball combo. Talents to watch out for are undoubtedly Warbreaker (reduced cooldown on Groundbreaker, level 1) and Intimidation (40% reduced attack speed on targets hit by Groundbreaker, level 7), which allow Garrosh to neuter basic attack reliant heroes much earlier than other heroes can. Into the Fray (can use Wrecking Ball on allies once every 30 seconds, level 7) is also an interesting one as it gives Garrosh his own version of Cleanse and the ability to say 'hey, you're mispositioned, stop it', which should come in handy whenever an ally is, well, not standing where they should be. It also breaks Lamb to the Slaughter on top of a few other nasty heroic abilities, which is great.
Stitches has finally ascended to godhood, and although I was slow to give him a seat in the core tier, repeated high level hero league bans and a high amount of tournament play speak for themselves. As stated last month, the Slam build remains an easy way of topping the damage charts all while being difficult to kill. Gorge has also seen an upsurge in popularity, and particularly on maps where combat tends to happen close by fortifications, such as Dragon Shire, Tomb of the Spider Queen, Towers of Doom, et cetera. Couple this with Falstad's Mighty Gust, and you have a game winning combo that isn't all that difficult to pull off.
I don't have much to say about Greymane that isn't self-obvious; Cursed Bullet is a great choice in a meta where healthy tanks are popular, though Go for the Throat is also re-emerging for blowup team compositions, thanks to its reliable damage and gap closing feature, on top of its ability to reset.
To shoehorn last month's tier list again, I made a snarky comment about Tassadar always being either too strong or too weak. Right now, he enables two borderline heroes–Illidan and Tracer–on top of providing flexible heroic ability choices for both more defensive and blowout team compositions. His versatility just makes him never feel like a bad pick, and Oracle keeps the Zeratuls at bay as a bonus.
E.T.C. is this month's surprise as players sift through forgotten heroes to solo tank, provide potential mapwide mobility through Stage Dive, and just generally provide reliable crowd control. You'll note a sore lack of interruption from a lot of high tier picks as well, making Mosh Pit about as good as it'll get.
We haven't seen The Butcher be more than a one trick for nearly two years now, but the brute is back in force, thanks for buffs several players have misinterpreted as nerfs. I suspect, however, that some of his newfound success may be due to players having some difficulty adapting to his new gank-heavy playstyle and generally counterpicking him. Shall the Brightwings, Cassias, and Li Lis of the world rise up to the challenge?
Xul has continued to perform well, and although he is the second least popular core tier hero (right behind Zeratul), he will keep on being effective on Blackheart's Bay, Dragon Shire, Gardens of Terror, Infernal Shrines, and Towers of Doom simply due to the importance of having a strong split pusher on these maps. Just make sure you go for Skeletal Mages, which tend to block a lot of those abilities strong tanks currently rely upon to get picks, on top of being generally disruptive.

Lost Cavern is a single-lane battleground that has been chosen for this week's brawl! Complete three matches to earn a Loot Chest.
Blizzard (Source)
This week’s brawl is Lost Cavern! It’s all-out mayhem on our single-lane battleground – Lost Cavern. Queue up, choose your Hero, and try to best to bring down the enemy Core!

Rules:
Shuffle pick - Choose from one of three Heroes before entering the battle.
Standard play - no talent or level restrictions.
The first team to destroy the enemy Core wins!
Rewards:
Complete three matches of Lost Cavern to earn a Loot Chest!
Find out more about the Heroes Brawl game mode on our Heroes Brawl site; and as always, you can find more information on this week’s Brawl by clicking the Brawl Info button at the bottom of the play screen when preparing to queue for the Brawl game mode.

It's time to get hyped! Gamescom 2017 is just over a week away and even though Blizzard hasn't shared the full schedule yet, we'll get to see Team expert battling it out against Team Liquid on August 23 from 14:00 to 15:30 CEST.
Both teams played against each other during Western Clash and Team expert easily defeated Team Liquid with a final score of 3:0. Will they be able to take revenge? Another interesting match is a YouTuber clash between Team ApeCrime & Team PietSmiet. Stay tuned for a full schedule.
Blizzard (Source)
Whether you’re an esports fanatic or just love live MOBA action, you’ll definitely want to catch our two epic show matches either in person or via live stream.
Team expert vs. Team Liquid
Some of the very best players in the world will be battling it out at gamescom, as Team Liquid and Team expert face off on Wednesday, August 23 from 14:00 to 15:30 CEST.

Team expert
Based in Germany, Team expert is known for executing unique drafts and utilizing niche heroes. Their roster is well accustomed to success—they finished second in the recent 2017 HGC Western Clash, and are currently ranked number two in the HGC Europe standings.

Team Liquid
Team Liquid boasts the longest running five-player roster in the HGC, and it just so happens that four of them are German! They’re sure to have plenty of local support at gamescom, which may be just what they need after recent battles with Team Expert. Their Heroes Showdown opponents knocked them out of the HGC Western Clash earlier this month. Can they take revenge in Cologne?

Team ApeCrime vs. Team PietSmiet
Get ready for the most legendary YouTuber clash this year! German music and comedy team ApeCrime will challenge gaming personalities PietSmiet on Friday, August 25 from 11:45 to 13:15. Be sure to follow along and find out who’ll be victorious in this battle of the titans.
Team ApeCrime
With more than five million subscribers over two channels on YouTube, ApeCrime is sure to have their fair share of fans in the gamescom crowd! Well known for their awesome music and hilarious videos, Cengiz Dogrul, Andre Schiebler, and Jan-Christoph Meyer will offer some top-notch entertainment on stage. With Michael ‘KendricSwissh’ Kratzel and Walter ‘MFPallytime’ Hopkins rounding out their team, they’re sure to bring a few surprises to the Nexus.
Team PietSmiet
PietSmiet has been producing gaming-related content since 2011, including “Let’s Play” videos, “Best Of” roundups, and their “Let’s Ask” series. More than two and half million fans follow their channels on YouTube, and they’re sure to earn a few more at gamescom. Chris Stachelhaus, Jonathan Apelt, and Sebastian Lenßen will be joined by esports expert Derek ‘DunkTrain’ Arabian and “Tryhard for Good” streamer Kevin ‘Kev1n’ Rubiszewski.